Low white blood cell counts are a sign of a suppressed immune system and can have many causes.
Everything from your emotional state to your diet can effect your immune system response and lower your white blood cell counts. Surgical or medical treatments and the natural aging process can wreak havoc with your immunities as well.
And if you’re fighting a chronic or deadly disease a suppressed immune system could effect your very survival.
You see whatever the cause, low immunity and low white blood cell counts prevent the body from being able to fully respond to infections and illness.
6 simple steps to avoid a suppressed immune system
Below are six simple steps you can take that can help prevent low immunity and keep your white blood cell counts high:
- Stop the sugar: Avoid sugar and keep sweet stuff to a minimum. Sugar prevents white blood cells from being their strongest.
- Bad bad fats: Eliminate unhealthy fats. Polyunsaturated fats in vegetable oils such as corn, safflower, and sunflower oil are deterrents to a healthy immune system.
- Beat the bulge: If you are overweight, lose a few pounds. Being overweight is very detrimental to your immune system and studies have shown that overweight people are less able to fight off infection.
- Wet your whistle: Drink plenty of water to boost the immune system as well as flush out toxins.
- Make a move: Exercise is a proven immune system booster. Exercise is best in moderation, however, since too much exercise may wear the body down and create immune system problems.
- Skip the stress: Avoid stress and try to relax. Stress is rightly called “the silent killer” and too much stress invariably leads to a lowered immune system.
Eat your way to a healthy immune system
There are many foods that can help boost both your immune function and white blood cell counts.
- Carrots and other red, yellow, orange, and dark-green leafy vegetables contain beta carotene which helps protect the immune system, especially the thymus gland.
Beta carotene and other carotenes also strengthen white blood cell production, and foods rich in beta-carotene help the body better fight off infection.
- Yogurt can give a healthy boost to your immune system. Yogurt helps your body produce antibodies and strengthens white blood.
- A cup of kale will give you your daily requirement of vitamin A, which is an antioxidant that helps your body fight cancer cells and is essential in the formation of white blood cells.
Vitamin A also increases the ability of antibodies to respond to invaders.
- People who eat more garlic have more natural killer white blood.
- Other helpful foods include chicken, kale, almonds, guava, crab, dark grapes and navy beans.
8 immune building supplements to consider
Supplements can play a big role in boosting immune function and building up white blood cell counts. Below are 8 immune-building superstar supplements to consider
- Oleander extract in herbal supplement form. One herbal oleander based supplement was 100% effective in a clinical trial of raising white blood cell counts in HIV/AIDS patients with extremely compromised immune systems.
- Astragalus Root helps stimulate white blood cells and protects against invading organisms. It also enhances production of the important natural compound interferon to fight viruses.
- Zinc is necessary for white blood cell function and it acts as a catalyst in the immune system’s killer response to foreign bodies.
- Vitamin C is an immune enhancer that helps white blood cells perform at their peak and quickens the immune system response.
- The trace mineral selenium is vital to the development and movement of white blood cells.
- Both Siberian ginseng (eleuthero) and Asian ginseng provide support for the immune system.
- Echinacea helps stimulate the immune system in a variety of ways, including increased white blood cell production.
- Green Tea also stimulates production of white blood cells.
Some other potent immune boosters are pau d’arco, suma, medicinal mushrooms, beta glucans and aloe vera.
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